(Verse 1) The box stood in the square where the promises were sworn, A silent, waiting monument to the choice that we were born To freely seize and wield it, to shift the turning tide, But the pages of the ledger were mostly blank inside. Some saw the game was rigged, some claimed the sides were all the same, So they stayed beneath the silence, refusing to play the flame. They found a kind of protest in the chair they left behind, Believing that their absence could reform the governing mind. (Chorus) Now there's a silence in the chamber, marked by the **Absentee Ballot,** The ghost of all the power that the weary wouldn't allot. It's the voice that stayed at home, the uncounted, chosen stillness, A vacuum where conviction might have broken through the chillness. The system didn't need to steal, the field was left unkept, The consequence of anger from the people who just slept. The regressive policies rush through, as easily as air, Because the power we surrendered is the burden that we bear. (Verse 2) The chair is left abandoned, the pencil still and dry, The future shaped by those who showed up, under a narrow sky. The struggle to stay hopeful, the exhaustion from the fight, Traded for the easy darkness where nothing feels quite right. We thought our disillusioned sigh would carry weight and sound, But the only thing that spoke was the empty patch of ground. The victory we forfeit is the loudest sound I hear, The **Absentee Ballot** whispering the cost of letting fear win here. --- ## 🧪 The Alchemist's Failure (Verse 1) They built the shining furnace, promised fire strong and clean, A formula for progress, magnificent and keen. The ancient art of turning base metal into gold, A utopian ambition, a future to behold. They tossed in human effort, complexity, and scale, Assuring us the outcome was too perfect now to fail. The prophets of the market, with calculus and light, Swore that this grand experiment would finally make things right. (Chorus) It is **The Alchemist's Failure**, the system that was sold, Still manufacturing misery, despite the promise of the gold. They stirred the pot with dogma, they heated it with speed, But harvested despair instead of planting necessary seed. The wealth was simply relocated, not miraculously grown, Leaving gilded, shining towers on foundations of bare stone. The great equation shattered, the truth is plain to see: The base metal remains base for the majority. (Verse 2) We offered all our essence, our spirit, and our drive, To keep the engine turning, believing we'd survive. We watched the smoke stack billow, believing in the plan, The inevitable perfection of the technological man. But the gold flowed only upward, defying gravity's law, And the gilded age of plenty concealed the fatal flaw. The system didn't break down; it worked exactly a

Absentee Ballad